As of June, Reus could have a female mayor at the head of the town hall for the first time in history. The formations with the greatest probability of occupying this position (Junts, ERC and PSC) have a woman in the first position on the list, in addition to Ciutadans and the CUP. Of the current parties with representation, only Ara Reus has opted for a man as number one.
In Reus, these elections will also be marked by the step backwards of the current mayor Carles Pellicer, who despite leaving the front line, closes the Junts list. Teresa Pallarès is the mayor of the formation. She is currently the Councilor for Economy, Knowledge and Housing and is one of the heavyweights of Junts in the Camp de Tarragona, to the point that she was a Government delegate. From Puigdemont’s orbit, until 2017 she was a member of the socialist ranks. Precisely, between 2003 and 2011 she was already a councilor of the Reus town hall for the PSC.
The number two of the candidacy of the Catalan nationalists was long in coming, to the point that Pallarès announced earlier that the current councilors Montse Caelles and Mariluz Caballero would accompany her in numbers three and four. Finally, the second place was revealed for a technical profile such as that of Joan Gavaldà , architect and vice president of the CN Reus Ploms. Number five is also a councilor for the current council: Pep Cuerba (sports), followed by the independence activist Sarah Dubois and the teacher and musician Jordi Salvadó.
During the pre-campaign, Pallarès has boasted of the work carried out at the head of the Department of Economy and Knowledge, especially through Redessa. The mayor of Junts has focused on axes such as commerce or innovation, but also on more specific actions such as eliminating the prior appointment when carrying out procedures at the town hall. He has also promised to reach 1,000 social housing floors, a proposal that Junts already launched in 2019 and which has not been fulfilled.
Noemà Llauradó, the ERC candidate, wanted to be mayor in 2019 after winning six councilors. She had the necessary votes: in addition to hers, the six councilors of the PSC and the three of the CUP, but finally the mayoralty was decided from the offices of Barcelona. Esquerra made Pellicer mayor in exchange for proclaiming Llauradó president of the Tarragona Provincial Council. Now, four years later, Llauradó is again the mayor of the republicans, with the baggage of the Diputació and this time, she says, she does want to be the first “republican mayor” of the city.
The candidate has once again relied on the current training councilors to occupy the first six positions on the list: Daniel Recasens, Montserrat Flores, Carles Prats, Marina Berasategui and Ã’scar Subirats. In number seven, he signed the president of the Shopkeepers’ Union of Reus, Meritxell Barberà , and for the eighth place he went to find Joan Anton Verge, who was already councilor of Sports, an area that they want to be “repulsive”.
ERC has made a banner over these years of betting on “strategic planning”, designing various documents such as the Reus Horitzó 32 City Strategic Plan. you have to “finish” the work done. In this sense, they have set priority issues such as trade, research or well-being, making a city more “friendly” by betting on taking space away from cars, or attracting industry by allocating 3,000,000 euros to the purchase of industrial land.
Andreu MartÃn was supposed to be the mayor of the PSC, but for personal reasons, he withdrew from the electoral race, making way for Sandra Guaita who, being a councilor, had gone to Madrid mid-term to be a deputy. With the change, the Socialists have sweated to make their candidate known, so in recent months they have dedicated themselves to stomping on the neighborhoods. Even, following the style of Joan Laporta, in February they placed a large poster in the Tarragona bus station where you could see his image with the phrase: “Let’s recover the capital. Let’s recover the pride of Reus.”
Guaita has partially renewed the list that accompanies him, with an outstanding signing, that of the journalist Josep Baiges as number two, and that will allow them to “expand” the voter base. The current councilors Anabel MartÃnez and Daniel Marcos repeat in starting positions, with number three and six respectively. In fourth position is the lawyer Manel Muñoz and in fifth, Pilar López, who was a councilor at the end of the 90s. Maria del Mar Escoda, president of the neighborhood association of the Gaudà neighborhood, is the seventh, and the UGT trade unionist Enrique MartÃn, the eight.
During these years the Socialists have denounced that the government has not taken them into account, and few motions presented by the PSC have gone ahead. With the Spanish government headed by the Socialists, the mayor has put pressure to unblock issues such as the new Bellissens station or the Vila-seca intermodal station. To occupy the Mercadal office, the Socialists have launched proposals such as creating Redessa COM, dedicated to local commerce, increasing the staff of the Urban Police or creating the T-Hospital and the T-16 to promote the free bus among minors and to go to the San Juan hospital.
It has not been the best time for Ciutadans. The party’s crisis also broke out in the capital of Baix Camp when, halfway through his term, Raúl Meléndez left the group to become a non-attached councilor. However, Débora GarcÃa repeats as head of the list of the liberals with Ricardo López as number two. López has also been a Ciutadans councilor this term and is an engineer by profession. Number three is Carlos MartÃn, coordinator of the group in Reus.
Ciutadans has been the formation that has taken the longest to present the list and during these weeks it has insisted on designing an “impartial and equitable” administration. They have also looked at security, stating that they will bet on more local police.
The current councilor of the CUP, Mònica Pà mies, will be the candidate of the pro-independence left in the city. In 2019 she occupied the third position, with Edgar Fernández and Marta Llorens ahead, who are now retiring due to the limitation of mandates that the CUP has. Number two is Arnau MartÃ, linked to Casal Despertaferro, and in third place is the cook Mariona Quadrada, who was a councilor from 2015 to 2019.
The anti-capitalists have defined themselves as the only “republican, left-wing and pro-independence” municipal formation. During the four years in opposition and these last few weeks, they have insisted on issues related to the environment, betting on the reuse of water from the Reus treatment plant, the internalization of the garbage collection service or promoting the preferential use of bicycles in the urban network.
Daniel Rubio repeats as head of the Ara Reus list, after eight years as councilor of the municipal government. He is the only male mayoral candidate with representation right now on the council. He is followed by Dolors Vázquez, who currently has the security and coexistence portfolio. And number three, the municipal formation has had Albert Piñol, son of the former councilor of CiU, Dolors Sardà . Piñol comes from the public highway and urban planning sector.
This time, Ara Reus appears with the PDeCAT, something that annoyed the mayor Carles Pellicer to the point that it tore the party apart. Be that as it may, training has been key to forming a government in the last two terms. However, in recent weeks it has distanced itself from large projects of the current government team such as the Carrilet market.
Two formations also aspire to enter the plenary, one to meet again and another to access for the first time. The PP will do it with SÃlvia Virgili at the helm, who is a music teacher and who was a popular candidate for Reus in previous elections, Sebastià Domènech number two.
Finally, who aspires to get a councilor is Reus en movimiento, a municipal formation headed by the former councilor of the CUP of Reus, David Vidal, who uncovered the Innova case. They define themselves as “centre-left” and want to be “transversal”.
The formations Entre Veïns, led by ValentÃn RodrÃguez, former president of the Federation of Neighborhood Associations, have also presented a candidacy for Reus, there is also a list of En Comú Podem, VOX and Valents. With a total of twelve candidacies, the post-election pacts to be able to govern the city will be essential. At the moment, prudently, no one marks red lines. Only some parties like ERC, Junts, PSC or the CUP verbalize a “sanitary cordon” against VOX or Ciutadans. What is evident is that after May 28, the parties that want to govern will have to sit down and talk.
